The Mutant Tamers
by snakes-on-the-ice
Summary: The Tamers have mutant powers. Like you need any other reason to read it. (Note: this is the new, revised The Mutant Tamers. The old one was deleted.)


**The Mutant Tamers**  
_Chapter One: Damn Right_

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Digimon. If I did, Matt would have never ended up with Sora. So yeah, I don't own it. 

**A/N**: So I deleted off the original chapters and have decided to start anew. Get ready for a better story, which I swear I won't lose interest in anymore. If you have any suggestions at all, leave them at your review. Or if you want to, e-mail me instead. The e-mail address is 

**Special Mention**: Thank you to Amethyst Blizzard a.k.a. Elizabeth for her inspirational words. This is for you. ) 

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Rika slammed her fist on her keyboard as she finished reading an e-mail from Alice, who was in America. Turns out everyone there teased her for her Japanese accent and long, Southern drawl that didn't go well together. Idiots. They didn't know whom they were dealing with. Alice was clearly unhappy in New York City, but Rika supposed she was being a good kid and decided to accept it for her dad, who, according to her, was happy everyday because of his new job. 

_I know if I had child, I wouldn't put my happiness before a happy childhood_, Rika thought angrily, as she had her glass of Coke float towards her. 

Indeed, Rika had both telepathic and telekinetic powers. It was gift, as her grandmother said. Rika thought it was a curse. She could forever hear the thoughts inside other people's heads, things she didn't want and need to hear. Being able to levitate objects wasn't easy to control either. Sometimes, she'd suddenly see a bag of chips coming towards her. 

It wasn't easy to hide it from the Tamers as well. They had no clue of her "special gift." No one did, besides Rika and her grandmother. Even Rika's mother didn't know it because the "gift" skipped her generation. 

At school, though, it came in handy. Whenever she didn't study for a test, she could just read the mind of the smartest person in class. Cheating, yes, but if she had the advantage, why not use it? That was her way of seeing it, anyway. 

"Rika! I'm home!" 

_CRASH_. Rika jumped in surprise and the glass of Coke dropped in midair. This was definitely not her day, Rika realized, as she heard a train of thoughts in her head: _Oh dear. That must be Rika. How many times do I have to tell that girl never to use her powers? What if someone saw? That would be horrible…. Why can't she understand that I'm disciplining her for her own good?_

A nanosecond later, her grandmother appeared at the doorway. "I assume you already know what I'm going to say?" she asked matter-of-factly. 

"Yes, grandma." 

"Then go on and pick that mess up. No levitating any of the broken glass. Do it like a normal person would." 

Rika sighed. "All right, all right. No powers." 

But the second her grandmother headed for her room, Rika levitated all the glass pieces except for the biggest one. Rika planned to give herself a small wound to cover up what happened. 

Just before she could cut herself though, her cell phone rang. It was Ryo. Rika reached her hand out and the phone instantly flew to her. "Hello? Who's this? Oh. Ryo." 

"Glad to hear from me, aren't you?" 

Rika scoffed. "Whatever. Why are you calling, nitwit?" 

"Henry called for Tamers-only meeting without Suzy and Jeri at three o'clock today at Central Park, Guilmon's old hideout. You coming, pumpkin?" 

"Rika is, pumpkin is not," Rika replied, ignoring Ryo's lame witticisms. 

Ryo smiled from the other line. "You're at home, right?" 

"Yeah. So?" 

"So I'll be there in about ten minutes." 

"Whatever. Bye." Rika hung up on Ryo, not waiting for him to say good-bye. 

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Ryo ran out of his room, going straight through his door. Unfortunately, Mr. Akiyama was in the room he just stumbled in. 

"Ryo!" he yelled. Out of habit, he lowered his voice. "What did I tell you about going through things and teleporting to places? What if there was someone in the room? They could tell the government! Every Akiyama in Japan would be arrested in tested in some Science maniac's lab!" 

"I'm…sorry, dad." 

"Sorry isn't good enough anymore, Ryo. You're not twelve anymore. You're fourteen now. If you want me to treat you like a teenager, you have to act like one, clear?" 

"Yes, sir." 

Mr. Akiyama sighed. "All right. By the way, I'll be home late tonight." His eyes shifted uncomfortably around the room. 

"You're meeting her again tonight, aren't you, dad? Kia Kamagua?" 

"Yes." 

"So I'm eating alone again tonight?" 

"Well…um, ye-" 

"No worries. I'll hang out with someone else tonight then. If I end up sleeping over at a friend's house, I'll leave a message on the answering machine, all right?" 

"All right." 

Ryo raced out the door before his father could say anything else. 

.............................................................................................................................................. 

Takato and Henry were walking together towards Central Park as they talked about every guy's favourite topic in the world--girls. Lately, Takato had started going out with Jeri. It was…fun, or so he claimed. And Henry had met a bunch of girls online and had already met a few of them. The others found it to be somewhat annoying since that's all that Henry would talk about for the past week but they knew he'd snap out of it once he meets "an undesirable someone," as Ryo "wisely" put it. 

"Oh yeah, and there's this one girl, Xioayu Matsoda, who's into karate and was like, 'We should fight if we meet one day' and she e-mailed me her picture and I was amazed at how much she looked like--" 

Sirens cut Henry off and Takato pulled Henry farther from the street which was now beginning to fill with fire trucks, firemen, an ambulance, paramedics and the sort. Without a moment's hesitation, they ran off, following the fire truck. A block later, the air started to reek of smoke. 

"There's a fire!" Takato told Henry. Henry nodded--as if he didn't already know. Takato was a little dense at times but he was good kid. 

When they arrived on the scene, they saw that a big building full of apartments and a house beside it were burning steadily to the ground. Takato stared, and started to think about using his powers. He looked around. Besides Henry, he didn't know anyone else. No member of the press was in attendance; there weren't even any onlookers. The paramedics were too busy giving people already rescued from the burning inferno oxygen while most of the firemen were inside, looking for more people to save, while the rest sprayed gallons of water on the fiery place. 

But when he heard the cry of a baby, Takato knew what he had to do. All fears and hesitation faded away. He glared at the fire and began taming the flames. 

Beside him, Henry saw an angry gleam in Takato's eyes, like there was fire in them, before he acted. He made water appear at the most base of the fire that he could see and began making the water lash out at the fire. In a few minutes, the fire was gone. The owner of the apartment and the house beside it counted the rescued people and saw that everyone had been saved. 

Takato and Henry immediately ran from the scene and on their way once again to Central Park. Once they got to the entrance, they stopped to catch their breath. 

"You…you did something to the fire, didn't you?" Henry asked Takato cautiously. 

Takato raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Like what?" 

"I don't know…." 

"Are you having another one of your insane ideas again?" 

Henry shrugged. "Am I insane if I think that you just controlled the fire and made the flames disappear?" 

"Only if I get to think that you concocted water at the base of the fire and helped me." 

"Then I guess I'm not insane. So…when did you know that you could…do this?" 

Takato brushed a branch away. "When I just met Guilmon, he accidentally threw a flamethrower at me. I yelled and it didn't affect me. It weirdly just separated when it reached me. My parents know about it. Dad has the same power, Mom's cool with it. Runs in the family. You?" 

"I control water, obviously. It came out once when I was seven. I was swimming at the beach and this wave crashed into me. Basically, I would've drowned but I didn't. It comes in handy." Henry opened the gate to access the staircase going up to Guilmon's old hideout. "Remember when we were in the DigiWorld and got separated from the others? Then we swam in water and realized we could breathe in it? Well, I thought it wasn't ordinary water, as I told you then, only because I couldn't control it." 

Takato asked, "Do your parents know about it?" as they climbed the staircase. 

"Nah. I don't think mine's genetic." 

"How about Suzy? Any signs of having mystical powers?" Takato wiggled his fingers for effect. 

Henry rolled his eyes. "Nope." They went around back and crawled through the hole they had made when their partner Digimon went back to the DigiWorld in addition to boarding up and barricading the doorway. They even camouflaged it with leaves and Kenta and Kazu grew some plants around the front. 

Inside the makeshift hideout were Kenta and Kazu. They were munching on chips and drinking soda in the middle of the place. Food, drinks and other things were piled up on the table they had put in before sealing the doorway. 

"Hey guys," Takato greeted them. Henry looked around, noticing that the hideout was much brighter than before, and said, "What's with the light? Who put that there?" 

Kenta grinned. "Kazu, me and Ryo. We installed it just the other day," he said, ominously spraying them with bits of chips from his mouth. 

"Honestly, Kenta. Haven't you ever heard of chewing with your mouth closed?" No one had to look me to know who that sour voice belonged to. They all sat down in a circle. 

"So Henry, what's up? Why the meeting without Jeri and Suzy?" asked Ryo. 

Henry cleared his throat. "As you all know, I've been making friends with tons of people online," he said pompously. "One day, while I was exchanging IMs with a few hundred people, I received one from a guy with a screen name ProDigi01, whose name turned out to be Izzy. We talked longer and soon it was evident that we were both chosen and apparently, he calls it being a 'DigiDestined.' 

"He lead me to a private Yahoo! Group. When I entered, I saw that it was **full** of stuff concerning the Digimon, including a list of every DigiDestined that Izzy knows of." 

Takato asked, "How many are there, so far?" 

"Thirteen, excluding us. Anyway, most of the DigiDestined live in Japan, in a city nearby called Odaiba, and they want to meet us." 

"ROAD TRIP!" yelled Kenta gleefully. 

"I also arranged a private chat with Izzy on Yahoo at eight o'clock tonight. You guys all right with that?" Henry added, a wary glance to Ryo, who usually had to say no to things not scheduled three days prior. Apparently, Ryo had a busy social life. 

Rika nodded. "I'm good." 

"Me too," said Takato. Even Ryo said yes. 

As they left hideout, Rika remembered to ask. "Henry, how come Jeri and Suzy were excluded from this meeting?" 

Henry gave a small smile. "Suzy's too young. Jeri, by the way…." 

"What about her?" Takato asked, sharply. 

"Um. Jeri? Well, mate, hate to be the one to have to tell you this but apparently, one of the guys that I've already talked to, not Izzy," he added unconventionally. "Another guy. His name is TK. We really connected and turns out that one of his good friends has a girlfriend. Or to be more precise, Jeri." 

Takato raised his eyebrow. "You're really going to believe him?" 

"Would you rather I not tell you next time I think your girlfriend could be cheating on you?" Henry asked, pointedly. 

Begrudgingly, Takato shook his head. 

.............................................................................................................................................. 

_TerrierTamer has joined the chat._

**TerrierTamer**: hey there. 

**DiePopDie66**: this is a private chat. Who are you? 

**ProDigi101**: relax, Matt. It's the guy I've been telling you all about. 

**TechKid**: you sure? 

**ProDigi101**: he wouldn't know the password if he wasn't 

**DiePopDie66**: not necessarily 

**TerrierTamer**: my name's Henry. 

**DiePopDie66**: oh whatever. 

**ProDigi101**: where's the rest of your team? 

_NameTaken has joined the chat._

_ryo has joined the chat._

_AlmostFourEyes has joined the chat._

_InNeedOfAScreenName has joined the chat._

_Kenta has joined the chat._

**TerrierTamer**: ryo is, yeah, Ryo. 

**TerrierTamer**: AlmostFourEyes is Takato. 

**TerrierTamer**: Aaaand…Kenta is Kenta. 

**TerrierTamer**: I'm not sure which is Rika and which is Kazu. 

**NameTaken**: Rika. 

**NYCGurl**: hey, I'm Mimi. ) 

**SoccerKing**: And I'm Tai. 

**DiePopDie66**: Matt. 

**SoraTakenouchi**: I'm Sora. 

**KillTaiVolume500**: hi. Kari. 

**TechKid**: TK. 

**ExEmperor**: Ken. 

**ProDigi101**: And I'm Izzy. There are only seven of us. 

**ryo**: I thought there were thirteen of you. 

**NYCGurl**: Michael had a game. And Wallace is sick 

**KillTaiVolume500**: Davis is grounded. 

**TechKid**: Yolei and Cody are at an emergency computer club meeting. 

**AlmostFourEyes**: okay. So…do you guys have a leader? 

**SoraTakenouchi**: Tai was the original one, with the original DigiDestined. 

**TechKid**: Davis is the new leader of the new DigiDestined. 

**SoccerKing**: awww, Sora, you're too sweet. ) 

**SoccerKing**: How 'bout you guys? 

**Kenta**: Takato. 

**AlmostFourEyes**: no way. 

**AlmostFourEyes**: when'd we vote on this? 

**ryo**: never. Just always thought it was unanimous. 

**InNeedOfAScreenName**: Takato's always been the leader, anyway. 

**AlmostFourEyes**: I HAVE NOT. 

.............................................................................................................................................. 

"A road trip? No, absolutely not." Rika's grandmother could be so harsh sometimes. 

Rika jumped up. "What! _Why_?" 

"You spend too much time with boys, Rika," her mother said. "Look, why don't we go shopping instead? We could buy you a new dress--" 

"No!" Rika yelled. "I'm going!" And with that, she ran to her room. 

Her mother stared after her. Rika's grandmother simply took a sip of her coffee. "Teenagers. They're all alike," she said.

_Hey Rika. I'm holding up nicely here. Thanks for your concern. Really means a lot to me that, even if she's on the other side of the world, I have a friend._

_NYC has been really stressing. There are so many things I want to do, but I can't because the kids at school are everywhere. I bumped into this girl at the bookstore earlier in the week. She's one of those popular girls. She was different, though--she didn't antagonize me, even if I sort of did. My bad. We've been e-mailing each other a lot. Her name's Mischa. (And as if that isn't enough coincidence to Mischa Barton, she's really pretty too. ) Really funny and more cynical than you would believe. Not like the other people I've met here. This girl is real._

_Well, we're going to a Dashboard Confessional concert tonight. Not my type of music, I know, but "Vindicated" is my favourite song, currently. Mischa's like, "But that's the song where they sold out!" and I get the feeling she's an old fan. She knows her music, Mischa._

_I'll post pictures on my website tonight. If not, tomorrow._

_Anyway, how is everyone there? Anything new?_

_Talk to you soon._

_Take care,_

_Alice_

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_Alice, hey. Don't forget, you also have boys here that are ready to beat up whoever picks on you there. Not that they'd win, of course._

_Mischa sounds like a cool person. And yes, I have to admit, Dashboard Confessional DID sell out with "Vindicated." I'll check your site out later tonight._

_Things have been okay around here. We're going on a road trip to meet DigiDestineds from another city. Ryo's still taping everything that's happening, apparently his documentary ambitions haven't faded yet. He's psyched and so are the rest of us. Except, you know, he's psyched that he's already finished his fifth tape and we're psyched about the road trip._

_So I guess that's all for now. I'm sorry this wasn't longer. I'm really tired._

_Always,_

_Rika_

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**A/N:** Well, that's all for now. Now go and review! )


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